


Troy: Character Timeline

by BorderSpam



Series: Twins Prompts [5]
Category: Borderlands (Video Games)
Genre: Mental Health Issues, Other, Self Harm, Siblings, Suicide Attempt, Violence
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-27
Updated: 2019-11-27
Packaged: 2021-02-26 01:00:26
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,908
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21584956
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BorderSpam/pseuds/BorderSpam
Summary: Finalised timeline following my version of this character's mental journey/state of ego based on the snippets of information available ingame. This is the Troy version in all my Twins Prompt's series, hopefully it’s interesting for people maybe looking for a somewhat logical bunch of HC content that works well with the basic info the game gave us.If you like any of this, feel free to use it. I’ll eventually expand on it in my own works.
Relationships: Troy Calypso/Tyreen Calypso, platonic - Relationship
Series: Twins Prompts [5]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1525211
Kudos: 15
Collections: Leech Lord AU





	Troy: Character Timeline

**Author's Note:**

> Right, so I saw an incredible breakdown of Troy’s mental journey/state of ego last night ( that I’ll see if I can get permission to post on Tumblr at some point ) that really kicked my confidence into overdrive for writing out a definitive timeline for the version of him I write about in drabbles/fics etc as it was so amazingly similar.
> 
> Writing this was like doing a jigsaw puzzle. Except ten pieces are missing, and you have 2 dominos and a Mrs Cupcake card instead.

##  **Pre Pandora Era - 28 years pre BL3**

  * Severe self esteem / image issues from very early childhood. Leda’s death left Typhon both terrified of Tyreen and desperately paranoid about her safety, leaving Troy to feel far less valued and loved as he found himself constantly failing to compete for attention from his remaining parent. 


  * Typhon never _outright_ called Troy a _freak_ , but he overheard plenty of discussions with his mother and with Tyreen explaining why he was so sick all the time, why he looked the way he did, why he was _broken_. He never discussed these, they festered in the back of his mind for the rest of his life. 


  * Strived from an early age to be _useful_ , being useful gave him the belief he was valued, and a “Great job kid!” from his father felt good enough that it could almost replace feeling loved.


  * Misses his mother intensely from the day she died, for the rest of his life. Had no one else to have platonic intimacy with bar his sister, which never felt as freely given as with his mother. 


  * Developed an extremely crippled sense of social behavior and rules. The only people the Twins could interact with till they landed on Pandora _( which I HC was between 18 -19 )_ were each other, and their Father. 


  * Left alone on a giant empty planet with no one _to tell them no_ , or instill an understanding of social rules to them regarding others, left them with only a feeling of personal value for _each other_. This is an _extremely dangerous_ state of mind for any person who will need to function in a social structure, especially a person in **power**. 


  * Had it hammered into them over and over by their father that the galaxy outside their home was filled with _murderers_. _Animals_. _Bandit filth_. Not like them, not like their parents, horrible, vicious things that would kill them the second they could. 


  * Internalised that to the point where it was a crucial part of their development of self as children. The twins would genuinely struggle to comprehend any other human they met _was a person,_ because they were told their whole developing lives that no one they would meet bar their father _would be_.



##  **Pre COV - 9 years pre BL3**

  * Lands on Pandora with Tyreen. Woefully underprepared and worried sick, didn’t want to leave Nekro but had no other choice but to go with his sister or die. Misses his father immediately, but avoids talking about it, knowing it will cause an argument.  
  

  * Disliked that their father had kept them on Nekro _intensely_ , but not enough to hate him the way Tyreen did. This never changed and the regret for leaving him only rotted inside him over the years. 


  * Very excited to finally meet new people, but his social skills are _learned_ through watching old echos and while he can mimic them, he doesn’t understand social intricacies as well as he’d hoped. This sabotages their first few attempts to communicate with Pandoran non bandit natives. 


  * Comes across as _weird_. Stutters, not good with eye contact, awkward in body language and very unnatural in appearance. _Extremely_ tall (6″7), very thin and sickly looking with sallow skin and dark under eyes. His missing arm and quarter of his shoulder draw _far_ more attention than he had ever expected and he becomes instantly self conscious of the damage to his right side, strongly disliking how it’s pointed out every time they try and interact with one of these _idiots_. 


  * The twins only had the clothes they had travelled in and at this point they are pretty much rags patched together over nearly 2 decades. Didn’t understand how much appearances were going to matter, Troy had been sure he’d be able to “Mingle with the locals no problem.”, and now feels like he’s _letting his sister down_ by failing to perform the way he’d been so sure of. They move onto the bandit clans once they get laughed out of the first small town they try to impress.


  * Their first few interactions with bandits have very bad results. They both get mocked a _lot_ , Troy gets insulted _even more_. This is the first time in his life he’s met other men bar his father and the harsh reality that he is _not like other men_ is really starting to hit hard. He’s monstrously tall, he has no muscle, he’s bony and sick and the bandits make very clear to him that he’s a _freak_.


  * Unable to defend himself verbally to people that don’t seem to speak a coherent language, he feels _impotent and emasculated._ Troy’s gift with words have always been his strong point, something he was proud of, and the bandits barely even understand what he’s saying. Any interest he'd had towards them as other people gets quashed. They clearly aren't the same as he and Ty, they are beneath them. Savages. They aren’t people after all. _His dad was right._


  * This is the point where he fully switches to seeing almost all others as non-persons _._ They aren’t people, they aren’t what he and Tyreen are, or they wouldn’t act like this in response to the twins. Any possible empathy he could have developed over time is aborted at this point, and he begins to craft the God King persona he understands he will need to disguise his shortcomings under if he’s going to be in the public’s eye.


  * Begins to create it piece by piece. Designs their outfits, designs his tattoo’s and mods, his monstrous arm, _their name_. 


  * The Calypso twins are born, and the COV with them.



##  **Early COV Era - 8 years pre BL3**

  * As he learns how to communicate with bandits and craft a persona for Tyreen that they will be drawn to, the COV starts to form. While the huge majority of their followers are people they see as not even being the same species as them, they do also begin to fill the higher ranks with people they are meeting over time that they see as having _value_. 


  * People with skills in categories they don’t, engineers, media experts, accountants, are drawn to the COV for the same reasons as the bandits. Opportunity, just a different sort.


  * Joining in the early days means having the twin’s ears, and those who have excellent ideas, or bring talent to the upper echelon that the twin's _don't have themselves,_ eventually end up as high priests and saints. Department leaders _(eg: Mouthpiece )._ These are the kind of people he sees _as people_ , though still not on par with himself or his sister in value. These are the few he would be capable of having functional conversations with, building simple relationships. 


  * He has found value in his ability to be _very useful_ within the COV. Leading the Media and Propaganda department has given him a huge amount of power, even if he still physically feels extremely frail. 


  * He’s settled into living in Tyreen’s shadow, she’s the star, but he’s the puppeteer, and he’s _happy_ for it to be that way for the most part. While she can sometimes step out of line or treat him like he’s not equal, he’s quick to remind her of her place during these outbursts, and their relationship is relatively stable.


  * Troy is fiercely loyal and _surprisingly gentle_ with people he has a bond with. Despite his desperation to have meaningful connections, to be cared for and liked as _himself_ , they don’t stay around him long.


  * No matter how hard he tries to give them what he thinks they want, they eventually leave, and he doesn’t understand that they are distancing themself because of how he treats _other_ people, not them.


  * Troy’s complete inability to view the vast majority of people _as people_ means he has a total lack of empathy towards almost everyone else, and this is a terrifying thing to experience first hand. He doesn’t understand this is why his “friends” leave, why they stop being friendly with him, or request to be transferred to another district. 



> "Why did you do _that_ to them..?"  
> -  
> "Huh? Ohhhh, relax haha, it's just a bandit."  
> -  
> "What do you mean, just a bandit, they _felt_ that Troy, what's wrong with you?’  
> -  
> "The hell? No, it's a b.a.n.d.i.t. It's not like _us_ , it's not like _you_ , it's just.. you know, a bandit! Doesn't matter what I do to em." -shrug-  
> -  
> "- _horrified silence_ -"

  * He blames himself each time this happens and damages his already fractured self esteem further. He can’t comprehend that his actions are the problem, because he simply has _no way to understand his actions are bad_. 


  * Each time someone close to him leaves, it’s another hit to his already crumbling self worth. He has absolutely no strong bonds with _anyone_ bar his sister, who at times seems to _barely like him_ , and he is genuinely desperate for _validation_ and _care_ from someone who likes Troy, not Calypso, not the God he pretends to be.


  * Every time another one of his "friends" vanishes, another of his little connections to his own humanity breaks. He gets angrier, and sadder, the _God King_ a little more snarling and quicker to snap. It's a sore point Tyreen tends to dig in during arguments too.


  * She doesn't need anyone else, but she's seen the _near manic excitement and happiness_ he has when he connects with another person over a shared interest or they show actual genuine kindness towards him and not his title. If that person then becomes upset with his lack of empathy, or scared of it and abandons him, it's another open wound on the already dying soul inside him that's barely still breathing.


  * He has a complete and defined understanding of _right_ and _wrong_ , but those rules only apply to _people_ , and his social development from infant to adult left his comprehension of other people so stunted, he cannot fathom that the vast majority of others _**are** people. _


  * _God King Calypso_ is a fucking nightmare to anyone bar the select view he sees as “ _people like him_ ”. A feral, cackling monster, as likely to airdrop a million dollars onto a tiny village and record the reaction, as he is to rip a bandits arms off during a raid and live steam them bleeding out. All the same to him. Just background NPCs in his game. Placeholder actors in his life. They don't matter. All that does matter is how _they_ make _him_ feel, or how they further his sister’s goals.


  * Every year that passes by leaves the _God King_ more polished and defined, more in control a persona, while inside its impenetrable shell Troy DeLeon is slowly being suffocated by the weight of his own sins, without having the ability to _understand_ he had been sinning at all.



##  **_God King_ Era - 5 years pre Bl3**

  * By this point, Troy’s isolation is now _deadly_. He is a deity, worshipped by billions, with absolutely no points of human contact in his life to anchor himself to reality. No one to help him understand how to apply his sense of right and wrong to his followers, only his sister, who is even more toxic and vicious than he is.


  * Every day since starting the COV, he’s distanced himself further from the worshippers, the bandits, the acolytes. They are _screaming war meat_ now, they are chips to barter with, numbers on a viewer count, flesh to tear into when he wants to feel _something_.


  * His relationship with Tyreen is crumbling. She’s quicker now to imply he’s not as important, _he’s_ not the Siren. She’s called him a _parasite_ in front of a merger board, a _burden_ during a discussion with department heads. Each new crack at his inner ego only strengthens the persona further. Makes it more attention seeking, more willing to lash out at others, more _vicious_.


  * His "friends"are long gone, either fled from the behemoth the COV now is, or far away in other districts, planets, cities. The people he is close with now in working relationships are held at arms length. He doesn’t let anyone near _him_ anymore, he’s afraid _they will leave too if he does._


  * The isolation pushes him further into the _God King_ persona every day. If he’s Troy Calypso, he doesn't NEED anyone else. The further he sinks into it, the more aggressive, the more twisted his actions become, but he doesn't _see_ it that way. This is what his followers _want_ , so it must be fine. Why wouldn't it be fine to ravenously tear into heretics on livestream if 8 billion people are tuning in to watch?


  * He’s becoming cruel, he’s becoming vicious, but the man he was before he reached Pandora is still whispering that Tyreen is treating him wrong. That this isn’t how it was meant to be, that he’s **not** _weak_ or a _burden._


  * But listening to that voice means also having to listen to the one telling him he’s warped into something disgusting that his _mother_ _would be so let down by_ , that his _father was right_ about him being a broken monstrosity. He continues to ignore it, and he loses himself further every day.


  * The deeper he recedes into the _God King_ , the more he starts having nightmares, the more those whispers in the back of his mind get louder. He does what he can to ignore them, but sometimes something will set him off.


  * An argument with Tyreen, a momentary feeling of regret for leaving his home, a pang of loneliness. He often can’t sleep, and he knows if he starts to wonder _why_ , clarity for the horrors he’s done could crush him.


  * Drugs, sex, bloodlust, he tries anything to take his mind off the intrusive thoughts that grow day by day. That he’s a failure. He’s a freak. He’s a murderer, but every now and then he'll wake up in a cold sweat and _hate himself_ so much that he wishes he’d never been born. 


  * The feeling passes very quickly as the _God King_ shifts back into place and swallows it down, but while it's there it's horrific. He see's himself from other people's eyes for just a moment and god _what has he turned into. What has he done. He's a fucking monster_.


  * The man he had been is so damaged under the mantle of this vicious God he's wearing as a skin that it's barely alive anymore, and it's what begs him to kill it in those fleeting moments where he sees past his own facade _,_ where he just for a second realises how many _people_ he has hurt.


  * He tore his throat out a couple of years before the start of the game story in a moment of lucidity after being sleep deprived for days on end. Tyreen reached him in time when his implanted vitals tracker each twin keeps for the other alerted her to his condition, but it was close enough that he was bedridden for days after her energy transfer closed the wound.


  * She had been _furious_ with him and made sure it was was kept hushed, the rest of the clergy believing he was on reprieve. Only the twins know the truth of what happened.


  * He never takes the collars off anymore now, the scars are still there. Convincing Tyreen that it had had happened during a nightmare when he’d left his prosthetic on by mistake was _easy._ Convincing himself to try and forget he’d been lucid and how it still feels like the right thing to do, is _not_. 


  * By the point the story begins, Troy is in a constant state of exhaustion, and knows deep down everything he has been through and done to others was for nothing. Tyreen doesn't care about him the way he does her. She may never have, or she changed, he doesn't know anymore. 


  * What he does know, is that he won't _ever be a real God,_ and that the only reason he’s still alive is because he is _useful_. 


  * Maybe he should never have tried so _hard_ to be _useful_.



Phew.

I guess in a nutshell, my Troy's greatest downfall is the _God King_ persona.

As long as that shit is active, as long as it's being worshipped, he's never going to snap into reality. The reality that other people are there, that he's been hurt so badly as a person, it's all impossible long as he is being treated as, and _believes,_ he is a God. 

The manic moments of clarity he has in the later stages of the COV rule are few and far between, but they eat him alive as he can’t understand _why_ he suddenly feels so terrible, _why_ he’s filled with such consuming remorse.

Peel the God King off the broken man underneath it and you leave him bare, confused, scared. You make him have to deal with reality, with people, with himself. That's when you get him to show regret, and understand what _he's done_ , and understand what Ty has done _to him_.

That's the _**redemption**_.

When he realises the game he was playing was real for billions, and **suffers** for it.  
  
It ends where it ends as my Troy ain't dyin' :P I'll get to my rewrite eventually.   
  
I hope to keep exploring these ideas in the future. Just desperately wish I’d as much to work with for Tyreen as I do Troy. _GB YOU HEAR THAT? YOU HEAR THATTTT??_  
  



End file.
